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Update: WCCC Fixes Problem With Contest Winner

10-4-2012

We've been following Monica Buchanan's story about a contest run by WCCC in Hartford -- Buchanan is an NBC-TV reporter and first covered the story of listener Michele Mele, who was furious when she says the radio station did not award her a contest prize she had won. Mele now says the station has made the situation right. But it makes you wonder what WCCC would have done if the TV station hadn't run a negative story on what happened.

The contest promised up to $10,000 worth of car repairs for a person in need. WCCC owner Woody Tanger called the TV station, "very concerned," and wanted to fix the problem as quickly as possible. The FCC doesn't take kindly to this kind of mistake.

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In an e-mail to NBC Connecticut, Tanger wrote, "You made every effort to find all the facts and we dropped the ball by not getting back to you in a timely manner." Mele says her vehicle, which she uses to get back and forth to therapy, was returned to her in almost exactly the same condition it was inn when she gave it to the sponsors of the WCCC promotion. That prompted her call the NBC-TV Troubleshooter team, which pursued the story.

WCCC Sales Manager Jay Schultz told NBC, "I was just trying to make sure I was in command of the facts before I talked to you guys. I think communication is something we needed to do better. We had a lot of people involved in this process, and I should have been overseeing it more tightly and we should have had communication." Mele now says she's happy. "We had a talk about everything that happened and they offered me compensation that I'm very grateful for. I thank them from the bottom of my heart for that. They made it right."

There is no mention as to whether a call was made to file a formal complaint with the FCC. The FCC has made it clear that it is a radio station's responsibility to fully award each of the prizes offered in over-the-air radio station contests.

Read the entire NBC story and watch the news report HERE(picture courtesy the NBC Connecticut website)